Politicization of COVID-19 health-protective behaviors in the United States: Longitudinal and cross-national evidence

Wolfgang Stroebe¹, Michelle R vanDellen², Georgios Abakoumkin³, Edward P Lemay Jr⁴, William M Schiavone², Maximilian Agostini¹, Jocelyn J Bélanger⁵, Ben Gützkow¹, Jannis Kreienkamp¹, Anne Margit Reitsema¹, Jamilah Hanum Abdul Khaiyom⁶, Vjolica Ahmedi⁷, Handan Akkas⁸, Carlos A Almenara⁹, Mohsin Atta¹⁰, Sabahat Cigdem Bagci¹¹, Sima Basel⁵, Edona Berisha Kida⁷, Allan B I Bernardo¹², Nicholas R Buttrick¹³, Phatthanakit Chobthamkit¹⁴, Hoon-Seok Choi¹⁵, Mioara Cristea¹⁶, Sára Csaba¹⁷, Kaja Damnjanović¹⁸, Ivan Danyliuk¹⁹, Arobindu Dash²⁰, Daniela Di Santo²¹, Karen M Douglas²², Violeta Enea²³, Daiane Gracieli Faller⁵, Gavan Fitzsimons²⁴, Alexandra Gheorghiu²³, Ángel Gómez²⁵, Ali Hamaidia²⁶, Qing Han²⁷, Mai Helmy²⁸, Joevarian Hudiyana²⁹, Bertus F Jeronimus¹, Ding-Yu Jiang³⁰, Veljko Jovanović³¹, Željka Kamenov³², Anna Kende¹⁷, Shian-Ling Keng³³, Tra Thi Thanh Kieu³⁴, Yasin Koc¹, Kamila Kovyazina³⁵, Inna Kozytska¹⁰, Joshua Krause¹, Arie W Kruglanksi⁴, Anton Kurapov¹⁹, Maja Kutlaca³⁶, Nóra Anna Lantos¹⁷, Cokorda Bagus Jaya Lemsmana³⁷, Winnifred R Louis³⁸, Adrian Lueders³⁹, Najma Iqbal Malik¹⁰, Anton Martinez⁴⁰, Kira O McCabe⁴¹, Jasmina Mehulić³², Mirra Noor Milla²⁹, Idris Mohammed⁴², Erica Molinario⁴³, Manuel Moyano⁴⁴, Hayat Muhammad⁴⁵, Silvana Mula²¹, Hamdi Muluk²⁹, Solomiia Myroniuk¹, Reza Najafi⁴⁶, Claudia F Nisa⁵, Boglárka Nyúl¹⁷, Paul A O'Keefe³³, Jose Javier Olivas Osuna⁴⁷, Evgeny N Osin⁴⁸, Joonha Park⁴⁹, Gennaro Pica⁵⁰, Antonio Pierro²¹, Jonas Rees⁵¹, Elena Resta²¹, Marika Rullo⁵², Michelle K Ryan^{53

1}, Adil Samekin⁵⁴, Pekka Santtila⁵⁵, Edyta Sasin⁵, Birga M Schumpe⁵⁶, Heyla A Selim⁵⁷, Michael Vicente Stanton⁵⁸, Samiah Sultana¹, Robbie M Sutton²², Eleftheria Tseliou³, Akira Utsugi⁵⁹, Jolien Anne van Breen⁶⁰, Caspar J Van Lissa⁶¹, Kees Van Veen¹, Alexandra Vázquez²⁵, Robin Wollast³⁹, Victoria Wai-Lan Yeung⁶², Somayeh Zand⁴⁶, Iris Lav Žeželj¹⁸, Bang Zheng⁶³, Andreas Zick⁵¹, Claudia Zúñiga⁶⁴, N Pontus Leander¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Psychology, University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands.
² Department of Psychology, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia, United States of America.
³ Laboratory of Psychology, Department of Early Childhood Education, University of Thessaly, Volos, Greece.
⁴ Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland, United States of America.
⁵ Department of Psychology, New York University Abu Dhabi, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
⁶ Department of Psychology, International Islamic University Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia.
⁷ Faculty of Education, Pristine University, Pristina, Kosovo.
⁸ Organizational Behavior, Ankara Science University, Ankara, Turkey.
⁹ Faculty of Health Science, Universidad Peruana de Ciencias Aplicadas, Lima, Peru.
¹⁰ Department of Psychology, University of Sargodha, Sargodha, Pakistan.
¹¹ Department of Psychology, Sabanci University, Tuzla, Turkey.
¹² Department of Psychology, De La Salle University, Manila, Philippines.
¹³ Department of Psychology, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, United States of America.
¹⁴ Department of Psychology, Thammasat University, Bangkok, Thailand.
¹⁵ Department of Psychology, Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul, South Korea.
¹⁶ Department of Psychology, Heriot Watt University, Edinburgh, Scotland.
¹⁷ Department of Psychology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary.
¹⁸ Department of Psychology, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia.
¹⁹ Department of Psychology, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Kyiv, Ukraine.
²⁰ Department of Social Sciences, International University of Business Agriculture and Technology, Dhaka, Bangladesh.
²¹ Department of Social and Developmental Psychology, University "La Sapienza", Rome, Italy.
²² School of Psychology, University of Kent, Kent, United Kingdom.
²³ Department of Psychology, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University, Iași, Romania.
²⁴ Departments of Marketing and Psychology, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America.
²⁵ Center for European Studies, Faculty of Law, Universidad Nacional de Educacion a Distancia, Madrid, Spain.
²⁶ Department of Psychology and Human Resources Development, Setif 2 University, Setif, Algeria.
²⁷ The School of Psychological Science, University of Bristol, Bristol, United Kingdom.
²⁸ Department of Psychology, Menoufia University, Al Minufiyah, Egypt.
²⁹ Department of Psychology, Universitas Indonesia, Jakarta, Indonesia.
³⁰ Department of Psychology, National Chung-Cheng University, Minxiong, Taiwan.
³¹ Department of Psychology, University of Novi Sad, Novi Sad, Serbia.
³² Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia.
³³ Division of Social Science, Yale-NUS College, Singapore, Singapore.
³⁴ Department of Psychology, HCMC University of Education, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
³⁵ Independent Researcher, Kazakhstan.
³⁶ Department of Psychology, Durham University, Durham, United Kingdom.
³⁷ Department of Psychiatry, Udayana University, Bali, Indonesia.
³⁸ School of Psychology, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia.
³⁹ Laboratoire de Psychologie Sociale et Cognitive, Université Clermont-Auvergne, Clermont-Ferrand, France.
⁴⁰ Department of Psychology, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom.
⁴¹ Department of Psychology, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada.
⁴² Mass Communication, Usmanu Danfodiyo University Sokoto, Sokoto, Nigeria.
⁴³ Department of Psychology, Florida Gulf Coast University, Fort Myers, Florida, United States of America.
⁴⁴ Department of Psychology, University of Cordoba, Andalusia, Spain.
⁴⁵ Department of Psychology, University of Peshawar, Peshawar, Pakistan.
⁴⁶ Department of Psychology, Islamic Azad University, Rasht, Iran.
⁴⁷ Department of Political Science and Administration, National Distance Education University (UNED), Madrid, Spain.
⁴⁸ Department of Psychology, HSE University, Moscow, Russia.
⁴⁹ Graduate School of Management, NUCB Business School, Nagoya, Japan.
⁵⁰ School of Law, University of Camerino, Camerino, Italy.
⁵¹ Research Institute Social Cohesion, Institute for Interdisciplinary Research on Conflict and Violence, and Department of Social Psychology Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany.
⁵² Department of Educational, Humanities and Intercultural Communication, University of Siena, Siena, Italy.
⁵³ Department of Psychology, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom.
⁵⁴ School of Liberal Arts, M. Narikbayec KAZGUU University, Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan.
⁵⁵ Department of Psychology, New York University Shanghai, Shanghai, China.
⁵⁶ Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
⁵⁷ Department of Psychology, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
⁵⁸ Department of Public Health, California State University East Bay, Hayward, California, United States of America.
⁵⁹ Department of Psychology, Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan.
⁶⁰ Institute of Governance and Global Affairs, Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands.
⁶¹ Department of Methodology & Statistics, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands.
⁶² Department of Psychology, Lingnan University, Hong Kong, China.
⁶³ Ageing Epidemiology Research Unit, School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, Imperial College London, London, United Kingdom.
⁶⁴ Department of Psychology, Universidad de Chile, Santiago de Chile, Chile.

PMID: 34669724
PMCID: PMC8528320
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0256740

Politicization of COVID-19 health-protective behaviors in the United States: Longitudinal and cross-national evidence

Wolfgang Stroebe et al. PLoS One. 2021.

. 2021 Oct 20;16(10):e0256740.

doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0256740. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Psychology, University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands.
² Department of Psychology, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia, United States of America.
³ Laboratory of Psychology, Department of Early Childhood Education, University of Thessaly, Volos, Greece.
⁴ Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland, United States of America.
⁵ Department of Psychology, New York University Abu Dhabi, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
⁶ Department of Psychology, International Islamic University Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia.
⁷ Faculty of Education, Pristine University, Pristina, Kosovo.
⁸ Organizational Behavior, Ankara Science University, Ankara, Turkey.
⁹ Faculty of Health Science, Universidad Peruana de Ciencias Aplicadas, Lima, Peru.
¹⁰ Department of Psychology, University of Sargodha, Sargodha, Pakistan.
¹¹ Department of Psychology, Sabanci University, Tuzla, Turkey.
¹² Department of Psychology, De La Salle University, Manila, Philippines.
¹³ Department of Psychology, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, United States of America.
¹⁴ Department of Psychology, Thammasat University, Bangkok, Thailand.
¹⁵ Department of Psychology, Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul, South Korea.
¹⁶ Department of Psychology, Heriot Watt University, Edinburgh, Scotland.
¹⁷ Department of Psychology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary.
¹⁸ Department of Psychology, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia.
¹⁹ Department of Psychology, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Kyiv, Ukraine.
²⁰ Department of Social Sciences, International University of Business Agriculture and Technology, Dhaka, Bangladesh.
²¹ Department of Social and Developmental Psychology, University "La Sapienza", Rome, Italy.
²² School of Psychology, University of Kent, Kent, United Kingdom.
²³ Department of Psychology, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University, Iași, Romania.
²⁴ Departments of Marketing and Psychology, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America.
²⁵ Center for European Studies, Faculty of Law, Universidad Nacional de Educacion a Distancia, Madrid, Spain.
²⁶ Department of Psychology and Human Resources Development, Setif 2 University, Setif, Algeria.
²⁷ The School of Psychological Science, University of Bristol, Bristol, United Kingdom.
²⁸ Department of Psychology, Menoufia University, Al Minufiyah, Egypt.
²⁹ Department of Psychology, Universitas Indonesia, Jakarta, Indonesia.
³⁰ Department of Psychology, National Chung-Cheng University, Minxiong, Taiwan.
³¹ Department of Psychology, University of Novi Sad, Novi Sad, Serbia.
³² Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia.
³³ Division of Social Science, Yale-NUS College, Singapore, Singapore.
³⁴ Department of Psychology, HCMC University of Education, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
³⁵ Independent Researcher, Kazakhstan.
³⁶ Department of Psychology, Durham University, Durham, United Kingdom.
³⁷ Department of Psychiatry, Udayana University, Bali, Indonesia.
³⁸ School of Psychology, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia.
³⁹ Laboratoire de Psychologie Sociale et Cognitive, Université Clermont-Auvergne, Clermont-Ferrand, France.
⁴⁰ Department of Psychology, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom.
⁴¹ Department of Psychology, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada.
⁴² Mass Communication, Usmanu Danfodiyo University Sokoto, Sokoto, Nigeria.
⁴³ Department of Psychology, Florida Gulf Coast University, Fort Myers, Florida, United States of America.
⁴⁴ Department of Psychology, University of Cordoba, Andalusia, Spain.
⁴⁵ Department of Psychology, University of Peshawar, Peshawar, Pakistan.
⁴⁶ Department of Psychology, Islamic Azad University, Rasht, Iran.
⁴⁷ Department of Political Science and Administration, National Distance Education University (UNED), Madrid, Spain.
⁴⁸ Department of Psychology, HSE University, Moscow, Russia.
⁴⁹ Graduate School of Management, NUCB Business School, Nagoya, Japan.
⁵⁰ School of Law, University of Camerino, Camerino, Italy.
⁵¹ Research Institute Social Cohesion, Institute for Interdisciplinary Research on Conflict and Violence, and Department of Social Psychology Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany.
⁵² Department of Educational, Humanities and Intercultural Communication, University of Siena, Siena, Italy.
⁵³ Department of Psychology, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom.
⁵⁴ School of Liberal Arts, M. Narikbayec KAZGUU University, Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan.
⁵⁵ Department of Psychology, New York University Shanghai, Shanghai, China.
⁵⁶ Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
⁵⁷ Department of Psychology, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
⁵⁸ Department of Public Health, California State University East Bay, Hayward, California, United States of America.
⁵⁹ Department of Psychology, Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan.
⁶⁰ Institute of Governance and Global Affairs, Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands.
⁶¹ Department of Methodology & Statistics, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands.
⁶² Department of Psychology, Lingnan University, Hong Kong, China.
⁶³ Ageing Epidemiology Research Unit, School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, Imperial College London, London, United Kingdom.
⁶⁴ Department of Psychology, Universidad de Chile, Santiago de Chile, Chile.

PMID: 34669724
PMCID: PMC8528320
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0256740

Erratum in

Correction: Politicization of COVID-19 health-protective behaviors in the United States: Longitudinal and cross-national evidence.
Stroebe W, vanDellen MR, Abakoumkin G, Lemay EP Jr, Schiavone WM, Agostini M, Bélanger JJ, Gützkow B, Kreienkamp J, Reitsema AM, Khaiyom JHA, Ahmedi V, Akkas H, Almenara CA, Atta M, Bagci SC, Basel S, Kida EB, Bernardo ABI, Buttrick NR, Chobthamkit P, Choi HS, Cristea M, Csaba S, Damnjanović K, Danyliuk I, Dash A, Santo DD, Douglas KM, Enea V, Faller DG, Fitzsimons G, Gheorghiu A, Gómez Á, Hamaidia A, Han Q, Helmy M, Hudiyana J, Jeronimus BF, Jiang DY, Jovanović V, Kamenov Ž, Kende A, Keng SL, Kieu TTT, Koc Y, Kovyazina K, Kozytska I, Krause J, Kruglanksi AW, Kurapov A, Kutlaca M, Lantos NA, Lemsmana CBJ, Louis WR, Lueders A, Malik NI, Martinez A, McCabe KO, Mehulić J, Milla MN, Mohammed I, Molinario E, Moyano M, Muhammad H, Mula S, Muluk H, Myroniuk S, Najafi R, Nisa CF, Nyú B, O'Keefe PA, Osuna JJO, Osin EN, Park J, Pica G, Pierro A, Rees J, Resta E, Rullo M, Ryan MK, Samekin A, Santtila P, Sasin E, Schumpe BM, Selim HA, Stanton MV, Sultana S, Sutton RM, Tseliou E, Utsugi A, van Breen JA, Van Lissa CJ, Van Veen K, Vázquez A, Wollast R, Yeung VW, Zand S, Žeželj IL, Zheng B, Zick A, Zúñiga C, Leander NP. Stroebe W, et al. PLoS One. 2022 Jan 21;17(1):e0263100. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0263100. eCollection 2022. PLoS One. 2022. PMID: 35061850 Free PMC article.

Abstract

During the initial phase of the COVID-19 pandemic, U.S. conservative politicians and the media downplayed the risk of both contracting COVID-19 and the effectiveness of recommended health behaviors. Health behavior theories suggest perceived vulnerability to a health threat and perceived effectiveness of recommended health-protective behaviors determine motivation to follow recommendations. Accordingly, we predicted that-as a result of politicization of the pandemic-politically conservative Americans would be less likely to enact recommended health-protective behaviors. In two longitudinal studies of U.S. residents, political conservatism was inversely associated with perceived health risk and adoption of health-protective behaviors over time. The effects of political orientation on health-protective behaviors were mediated by perceived risk of infection, perceived severity of infection, and perceived effectiveness of the health-protective behaviors. In a global cross-national analysis, effects were stronger in the U.S. (N = 10,923) than in an international sample (total N = 51,986), highlighting the increased and overt politicization of health behaviors in the U.S.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

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Politicization of COVID-19 health-protective behaviors in the United States: Longitudinal and cross-national evidence

Affiliations

Politicization of COVID-19 health-protective behaviors in the United States: Longitudinal and cross-national evidence

Authors

Affiliations

Erratum in

Abstract

Conflict of interest statement

References

Publication types

MeSH terms

LinkOut - more resources

Full Text Sources

Medical